Rosen Weighs In On Sotomayor Nomination

And does so favorably: “Of course, Judge Sotomayor should be confirmed to the Supreme Court,” he writes. “She obviously wasn’t my first choice, for reasons I reported three weeks ago, having mostly to do with concerns about her temperament reported to me by former clerks and New York prosecutors. But I hope and assume the White House wrestled seriously with those questions of temperament and weighed them against Sotomayor’s other obvious strengths.”

He says he objects to the way conservatives have used original article both today and in recent week. “Conservatives are already citing my initial piece on Sotomayor as a basis for opposing her,” Rosen notes. “This willfully misreads both my piece and the follow-up response. My concern was that she might not make the most effective liberal voice on the Court–not that she didn’t have the potential to be a fine justice.”

That piece characterized the possibility of a Sotomayor nomination as a “gamble.” More on conservatives citing his article later today.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Brian Beutler is TPM's senior congressional reporter. Since 2009, he's led coverage of health care reform, Wall Street reform, taxes, the GOP budget, the government shutdown fight and the debt limit fight. He can be reached at brian@talkingpointsmemo.com